Top Tips to develop the global dimension in schools

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Growing interdependence between countries changes the way we view the world and ourselves. Schools can respond by developing a responsible, international outlook among their young people, based on an appreciation of the impact of their personal values and behaviours on global challenges.

We would like all schools to be models of global citizenship, enriching their educational mission with activities that improve the lives of people living in other parts of the world.

There is a global dimension to every aspect of our lives and communities. Sustainable development isn’t just about the environment – and it isn’t something we can achieve in isolation. The air we breathe, the food we eat and the clothes we wear link us to people, environments and economies all over the world. The decisions we make on a daily basis have a global impact.

Schools, through their curriculum, campus and community, have an important role to play in helping pupils to make sense of the complexity of our world and their place in it.

Explore local, topical issues from a global perspective

The global is not far away but right here. There is a global dimension to local issues and exploring this can provide an illuminating insight into topics such as food, traffic, climate, migration and equality. It also provides an accessible way into understanding complex global issues.

• Use the increased flexibility encouraged by the primary strategy and the revised secondary curriculum to respond to issues as they arise.

• Provide space for teachers to discuss and reflect on these issues.• Pupils get a lot of their information about global issues from the

media so need a lot of support to interrogate this information critically and consider a range of perspectives.

Look for the global dimension in the way your school operates

There is a global dimension to each of the eight doorways of the National Framework for Sustainable Schools. Exploring it can engage and motivate both teachers and pupils.

• Involve the whole school community in considering the implications of living in a complex, interdependent world for the vision and aims of the school.

• Designate a specific member of staff to develop the global dimension across the school.

• Consider the unique contributions of each subject to understanding the global dimension.

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• Celebrate small steps along the way to reinforce the importance you place on these issues.

• Create visual displays of pupils’ global work and think about how global thinking can contribute to developing a sustainable school.

Find out what impact your school’s buying has on other countries

Purchasing choices made by schools can make a real difference. Debating fairly traded products, ethical banking, green energy, local sourcing, waste disposal options and other management decisions provides a useful way for staff and children to reflect on global issues, and how the school can help address them.

• Use these decisions as a way to involve parents, governors and the wider community in the work you are doing.

• Pupils can play an important role in these debates which can be used to create learning opportunities. In this way, pupils can make connections between what happens in the classroom and the management decisions they see acted out around them.

Use global teaching resources in delivering the curriculum

There are lots of great resources available to support you in developing the global dimension in your school.

• Search for books, films, posters and websites with a global dimension at www.globaldimension.org.uk. From climate change to poverty, water to fair trade, this website is a guide to resources for all age groups and subjects.

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• Keep up-to-date with resources by signing up to the Global Dimension Website’s regular e-newsletter. And look out for other relevant newsletters such as those available from development, human rights and environment organisations and your local Development Education Centre (DEC). For more information on DEC go to www.dea.org.uk/membersearch.shtml?als[cid]=440651

Find out about local and national support from other organisations

DECs, non-governmental organisations, local authorities and others can support you with resources, newsletters, speakers, professional development and projects (see overleaf to find them).

• Use an external organisation such as this to act as a critical friend, helping you to reflect on what pupils are learning, teach about complex and controversial issues and avoid pitfalls such as reinforcing negative stereotypes.

Look at the work of UNICEF and United Nations bodies

The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child also refers to responsibilities of children, in particular to respect the rights of others. This pairing of rights and responsibilities for all children across the world is a valuable subject for young people to explore and to understand their role as both local and global citizens.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are a blueprint for a better future. Increased globalisation promises faster growth, higher living standards and new opportunities, and yet across the

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world lives are starkly disparate. The MDGs aim for measurable improvements in the most critical areas of human development.

The United Nations Girls Education Initiative recognises that sustainable development and the eradication of poverty will only be achieved with quality education for all – girls and boys alike. Since girls face much greater obstacles, special efforts are needed to get them in school and ensure that they complete their education.

Consider linking your school to another operating in a different cultureA partnership link with another school can help pupils to appreciate global connections and interdependence as well as find out about similarities and differences between places and cultures. An effective, sustainable and equitable school partnership requires effort and commitment on both sides, at all levels of the school community.

• Consider linking with another school in England or even in your local area. A link with a school operating in a different context can start pupils thinking about the global in the local, examining their own values and attitudes and valuing diversity.

• Keep thinking about the learning outcomes of your school partnership, both intended and unintended.

• Remember there are lots of global aspects to your own locality that would be interesting to explore. Develop a local-global approach and try and make sure your school link doesn’t reinforce a perception of the global as ‘out there’ and ‘far away’.

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• Take advantage of the advice and funding options available for international linking (see overleaf).

Make time for professional development and reflectionIt takes time to develop a global perspective, a view on the world that makes connections between diverse issues, people and places. Furthermore, with all its complexities, the global dimension demands an approach to teaching that accepts that the teacher cannot have all the answers and this takes confidence and skill.

• Plan CPD for all staff on active, participative methodologies and teaching controversial issues.

• Investigate CPD provided locally (see 4).• Keep the focus on developing a global perspective so that it

starts to feel natural to see the global dimension in all learning and aspects of school life.

• Provide spaces and opportunities for reflective and critical thinking for the whole school community including governors.

• Support teachers to consider their own perceptions and biases.• Use the QCA ‘Big Picture’ of the curriculum to take a step back

and reflect on the aims of education.

Highlight your global dimension work in your self–evaluation form (SEF)Ofsted now looks for alignment with the National Framework for Sustainable Schools in its inspections (see questions 1b and 4f in the SEF).

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• Use DCSF’s sustainable school self-evaluation (s3) to consider how the work you are doing on the global dimension can be highlighted in your Ofsted SEF. Try to demonstrate the real teaching and learning that has occurred, for example, explain that pupils have critically engaged in a range of issues around the topic of global trade (rather than just saying that Fairtrade products are used).

• Use DCSF’s planning tool for sustainable schools to further develop your global dimension work.

Promote optimism and actionWe all feel disempowered by doom and gloom, and this can leave us feeling unable to make a difference. Greater understanding, especially when it is accompanied by action, can help to turn this situation around. The global dimension helps pupils understand global issues and explore ways of addressing them within and beyond school. This more often leads to feelings of optimism and a wish to contribute to positive change in the local/global community. The Primary Review Community Soundings (www.primaryreview.org.uk) reported on a deep pessimism about the world in which today’s children are growing up but emphasised that pessimism turned to hope when people “felt they had the power to act” and that “where schools had started engaging children with global and local realities as aspects of their education they were notably more upbeat”.

Further information and guidance on the global dimension can be found at the following:

DCSF resources:

• Sustainable Schools website• s3: sustainable schools

self-evaluation• Planning a sustainable school

www.teachernet.gov.uk/sustainableschools

Here you will find comprehensive information, publications and support for sustainable schools.

Find teaching resource:

www.globaldimension.org.uk

Use the search facility to look for resources by subject, theme, age or keyword.

Sign up for the termly newsletter.

Find local support:

See: www.globaldimension.org.uk/ localsupport for global dimension providers.

Contact your local authority to find out about relevant citizenship, sustainable development and international support.

DECs are independent local centres that provide advisory, training and resource support for teachers in learning about global and sustainable development issues and how to ‘think globally and act locally’. Many centres offer advice and support, a library service, training and in-school talks.

Find national support:

For DEA members, see: www.dea.org.uk/membersearch.shtml

For national organisations providing speaker services, see: www.global dimension.org.uk/speakers

Many national organisations provide support for the global dimension through resources, projects and speaker services.

See Developing the Global Dimension in the School Curriculum DfES et al (2005): www.teachernet.gov.uk/docbank/index.cfm?id=9325

The booklet includes opportunities to integrate the global dimension in all curriculum subjects and the whole school. Hard copies are available free from enquiry@dfid.gov.uk

See guidance for the new curriculum: http://curriculum.qca.org.uk/key-stages-3-and-4/cross-curriculum-dimensions/index.aspx

Use the curriculum dimensions such as ‘identity and cultural diversity’, ‘global dimension and sustainable development’. Developed for secondary schools, these are also of value to primary schools

See QCA’s Global Dimension in Action: A curriculum planning guide for schools at www.qca.org.uk/qca_15333.aspx

This QCA publication for primary and secondary schools is designed to help teachers reflect on the global dimension in the curriculum and give ideas for introducing and developing it.

Practical activities help stimulate a conversation about the global dimension and focus on three critical questions:

1 What are you trying to achieve?2 How can you best organise learning?3 How well are you achieving your aims?

Case studies show how different schools have answered these three questions and offer examples of the global dimension in action.

Find a partner school in England: www.schoolslinkingnetwork.org.uk

Linking with another school in England can help pupils to appreciate a diversity of perspectives and contexts, essential skills for the global dimension.

The National Gateway has been set up to facilitate links between schools across England. The Schools Linking Network aims to support schools to find a link school and, during the linking process, offer resources and professional development.

Find a partner school internationally through: www.globalgateway.org

The British Council administers DFID Global School Partnerships: www.britishcouncil.org/globalschools

The DCSF’S Global Gateway runs a free global school linking service. Your school can link in Europe, India or Nepal, Brazil or South Africa, USA, Japan or Australia to relate and debate global issues such as fair trade, energy conservation and climate change. Links in rural Ghana or Uganda demonstrate the reality of growing up and going to school with very few resources – in fact global issues are brought home through school partnerships!

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© Crown Copyright 2008 Published by the Department for Children, Schools and Families

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This project has been supported by the Sustainable Development Commission.

This document has been produced to support the Sustainable Schools Strategy. For more information, go to www.teachernet.gov.uk/sustainableschools